Editorial: Quinn has no margin for error on ethics

Thursday

May 28, 2009 at 12:01 AMMay 28, 2009 at 4:06 AM

This is how it started with Rod Blagojevich. The stories started to drip out from Chicago. Stories about big contributors getting lucrative state contracts. Stories about powerful, unpaid Blagojevich advisers seeking to influence state boards. The drips turned into a little trickle. The trickle turned into a stream. And it culminated with the disgraced former governor’s Dec. 9 arrest.

This is how it started with Rod Blagojevich.

The stories started to drip out from Chicago. Stories about big contributors getting lucrative state contracts. Stories about powerful, unpaid Blagojevich advisers seeking to influence state boards. The drips turned into a little trickle. The trickle turned into a stream. And it culminated with the disgraced former governor’s Dec. 9 arrest.

When he was inaugurated in 2003, Blagojevich said these words: “I will govern as a reformer.”

Among Springfield’s political class and media during his first year, Blagojevich was viewed as unserious, kind of a clown but not yet corrupt. That changed very quickly and well before his re-election run in 2006.

Given those events, the actions of Gov. Pat Quinn’s political aide, Holly Copeland, in cold-calling interest groups for $15,000 campaign contributions as the legislative session ends, were unbelievably stupid.

Illinoisans know Pat Quinn. Nobody wants to believe Quinn would sanction such inappropriate behavior, but he did admit that Copeland was instructed only to contact groups that had previously shown interest in raising money.

Under normal circumstances, that is wrong before the legislative session — and the issues to be settled by it — is over. During a session in which Quinn is attempting to pass a slew of ethical reforms, it’s comically dumb.

While Quinn apologized, he didn’t fire Copeland, which makes us question his commitment to accountability in light of the scandals the state has experienced over the last decade.

The governor has no margin for error when it comes to such behavior. It’s our hope this was a case — and hopefully the last — of amateurish behavior by Quinn’s political and management teams.

The drip that dropped late last week has to be the last if Quinn hopes to keep the governorship in 2010. With Illinois voters, he gets — at best — two strikes before he’s out.